


with waves of this feeling

by palateens



Series: Grand Larsony [3]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Break Up, M/M, Multi, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-14 03:00:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10527447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palateens/pseuds/palateens
Summary: A throwback to when Jack broke up with everyone.





	

**Author's Note:**

> for Ransom week
> 
> Prompt: and the door clicked shut

It was a Tuesday in January. Ransom remember this because it was the only day of the week that semester when he had time to take an afternoon. He heard a soft rasping at the door.

“Come in,” he shouted, confused by who didn’t have class at this time.

Jack comes in, and there’s something about his frown that’s unsettling. It doesn’t have the normal tired, disgruntled ire to it. His back hunches like a man who’s fought for too long. His chin is lifted with a defiance against his eyes. Justin feels his stomach drop. There’s no chance in hell that this is a pleasant visit.

He sits down next to Ransom on Holster’s bed. Jack leans over, clasping his hands together like a silent prayer.

“What’s up,” Justin murmurs, reaching to smooth the tension from his back.

Jack stops his hand, taking it into his lap instead. He stares at his bright yellow tennis shoes. Justin remembers the day he bought them. Some of the upperclassmen had been giving him a hard time ever since he became captain. Shitty dragged the five of them onto the commuter train and headed to Boston. The wind was biting, but had nothing on a bad winter day in Toronto. They walked as a unit; sometimes holding hands and shouting at the top of their lungs, sometimes content to be in each other’s presence. They ended up in a Puma store on Newbury Street.

Ransom smiles to himself thinking of that day. Jack had been so hesitant to buy those shoes. It was so hard to convince him to take care of himself sometimes. He feels Jack’s lips ghost his hand. He kisses Justin’s hand with a reverence. But that’s how Jack was. He didn’t love with words. He loves with his eyes and his actions—with the way he always brings snacks when Ransom’s about to go into study mode and the way he checks anyone who messes with them mercilessly.

“We have to stop,” Jack says finally.

Dread fills every inch of Justin’s body. “Stop what?” he asks neutrally.

“This…thing we do,” he shrugs.

“Ok,” Ransom inhales slowly. He amends, “no, it’s not ok. I—I need you to talk to me.”

Jack refuses to look up, “I don’t know what to say.”

“When you say we,” Ransom licks his lips. “Who do you mean?”

“Everyone,” he whispers like a curse.

“You mean the five of us?” Ransom clarifies.

“Yes.”

“What do we do that makes you uncomfortable?”

“Nothing,” the words are soft, remorseful.

“Ok.” That’s something, Justin tells himself. There’s a way to salvage this. “What do you want us to stop doing?”

“We can’t fuck anymore,” Jack asserts quietly.

“Ok,” Ransom concedes. It seemed to be the most obvious point of contention. It still hurt.

“And we can’t kiss.” Because apparently, that’s just as bad.

“Alright,” he nods. Not because he agrees, but because he’s listening. He’s really listening to what Jack has to say. His message seems to be loud and clear, no more intimacy.

“And you can’t act like this isn’t my fault,” Jack adds.

Ransom sighs, scrubbing his face with his free hand. It’s hard to keep a grip, but he has to. “Do you want me to be angry with you?”

“Adam was,” he shrugs.

He expected a fight, Justin realizes. “Did he react badly?”

Jack shakes his head, “he was busy lifting weights.”

“You told him first,” Ransom concludes.

Jack nods.

“Were you hopping he’d fight back?”

He’s silent for a moment. Ransom notices the way his fingers twitch. He squeezes Jack’s hand at the pulse of a heartbeat.

“Can you breathe with me?”

Jack nods, listening as Ransom talks him through inhaling, holding his breath, and exhaling. It takes a while for him to calm down, but it’s ok. Justin would be kidding himself if he ignored the countless times Jack had helped him through panic attacks.

“I don’t know if what I’m doing is wrong,” Jack confesses. “I don’t want us to resent each other when this blows up.”

Ransom traces over each word in his mind. He feels himself sift through every memory he’s had of Jack, of this thing they do, wondering where he got this idea from. “You think we’re gonna hurt each other if we stay together.”

Jack looks at him for the first time since he entered the room. His eyes are as vast as space, stretching out forever. Ransom thinks he’s never seen them so young, so blue. Jack’s scarred. He doesn’t know what he’s doing; he just said so.

“Would it be so bad if kept going until that happened?” Justin needs to know if there’s anything worth saving. He can hold out forever if that’s what Jack needs. But he can’t guess and hope things will be ok.

“Yes.” Jack’s voice is harsh and cold.

Justin stares at him for the longest time. Those eyes he’s seen a million times before stare back at him like a stranger. It’s like everything they’d built together had come undone in Jack’s mind. Therefore, there was nothing left to save.

“Ok,” Ransom concedes. Not because he wants to, but because Jack’s already broken Adam’s heart. And he can feel the same tightening in his chest as they speak.

Jack nods. Ransom’s hand slips from his grasp as he rises off the bed. It takes centuries for him to cross the room. In that time, every if and almost crosses Justin’s mind: every trip they said they’d take, every movie they hadn’t gotten to watching, every bet they hadn’t settled, every kiss he would never receive. Jack closes the door behind him softly.

The door clicks shut, and everything Justin knew about love goes with him.

**Author's Note:**

> Fic title: lyrics from On + Off by Maggie Rogers
> 
> Side note: if you go to [my Grand Larsony tag on Tumblr](http://abominableobriens.tumblr.com/tagged/grand%20larsony) there's a lot of extra content that isn't getting posted here yet. And feel free to say hi if you're on there. I love talking about these three.


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